Core Statement (English)

World in Common

Where we stand

Our purpose is to help inspire a vision for an alternative way of living where the technological and material resources for creating wealth (factories, farms, land, communications etc.) are owned in common

and

democratically controlled by the community on an ecologically

sustainable and socially harmonious

basis. Individuals will voluntarily

co-operate to produce goods and services and will freely take these

from

the stores and other such establishments, according to their

needs.

Buying and selling, money transactions,

profits and employment

for a wage or salary etc., will cease altogether, along with the very

idea of property

itself

(except for individual possessions for one’s

own use). Individuals will be able to freely develop their

creative potential and to make meaningful decisions that will allow them, at last, to take real control of their

own lives.

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Such a society requires two things. Firstly, the technological capacity

to produce enough to satisfy

everyone’s reasonable needs. This is

something we have had for a long time now. Poverty persists,

not

because we lack the productive potential to eliminate it but, rather,

because present-day society only

meets human needs if they are backed up by “purchasing power” and because more and more of that

productive potential is being squandered on socially useless activities whose only function is to keep our

money-economy going. Secondly, the achievement of this future society requires that large numbers of

people clearly understand what it will involve and support its establishment. This, however, is still far from

being the case today and is one of the reasons why we have come into existence as a conscious and

democratic organisation without leaders – to help this to happen.

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To bring about this alternative way of living we must recognise the

nature of present-day society as one in

which a tiny minority – either

through private corporations or the state – effectively own and control

the

means of producing and distributing wealth, leaving the rest of us

relatively powerless and compelled to

sell our working abilities to

this owning class, usually in return for a wage or salary. Putting our

trust in

politicians or leaders to solve the many social problems we

face today is ultimately futile since we currently

live in a global society

that is essentially organised to serve the interests of this minority only, rather

than

the population as a whole. Despite the courageous efforts of ordinary people the world over to resist the

powerful political and economic forces that work against

them, we are still faced with much the same kind

of social problems that we had over a century ago.

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To get rid of this society peacefully requires that the majority of

people – without distinction of gender,

sexuality, ethnic/cultural

identity or religion – unite for this purpose and, at the same time,

oppose those

poisonous ideologies that strive to divide, distract and

disempower us. It requires that we organise

consciously and

democratically to establish an alternative society ourselves from the

bottom up, without the

intervention of leaders or politicians and that we critically support practical attempts in the present to

empower ordinary people and strengthen their resistance to the global market and state. To that end, we call

upon anyone sympathetic to this broad objective to join with us – irrespective of differences of opinion on

matters of secondary importance – to help build a strong, inclusive, but